


Dreams of Death

by Nelja-in-English (Nelja)



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Do Not Archive (The Magnus Archives), Dream Sex, Eye Trauma, Fictional Religion & Theology, M/M, Power Dynamics, Religious Content, Tentacle Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-24
Updated: 2019-04-24
Packaged: 2020-01-25 21:30:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18582955
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nelja/pseuds/Nelja-in-English
Summary: Jon visits Oliver's dreams. Both of them object to it.





	Dreams of Death

Jon doesn't remember any part of this statement.

He understands in whose dream he is, thanks to Georgie's frustrated explanations. The tape with "Antonio Blake's" second statement had disappeared when they looked for it. But he has read the first one. He remembers. He remembers lots of things these days.

He can recognize these black tendrils, pulsing with a sickly red light. He knows what they are. Death. The End.

He doesn't recognize the boat at all. 

So he watches, with more interest and less resignation than he usually does in these dreams. The only ones he has had, now, for a long time; it seems the Eye doesn't care for the senseless chaos of normal dreams. Jon looks for the dreamer. He never saw his face.

Then one of the tendrils wraps around his ankle.

His dream-heart skips a beat. He knows these nightmares well. He can look and listen and know - he _has_ to look, to listen and to know - but he never touches anything. And nothing can touch him either. It shouldn't - it's not normal.

"So the Archivist deals in dreams too," says a voice behind him. Jon turns around - and sees a man - and knows his name. Oliver Banks. Tall, black skin, harmonious features, and thoroughly dead eyes in a face without sadness, but without hope. "From what I've heard, it's not your main power, though. I'm not sure you want to test it against mine."

"It's not about what I want," Jon answers. 

Oliver has a tired smile. "I know the feeling. I have nothing against you, Jon. Or Archivist? Maybe Archivist, here."

And then tendrils wrap around Jon's full body. He tries to fight it, but he can't damage them in any way, can't even make them move. And Oliver is on him, grasping his shoulders. 

"Everywhere they touch you," he whispers in Jon's ear. "It's the places where debris fell on you when the wax museum exploded. You know you should have died, but do you know you _were_ dead? No heart, no breath, only your God keeping your mind alive." 

Oliver waves his hand up, and of course, it's here. The Eye. It looks so small here, barely ten times bigger than the moon - Jon could laugh at himself for such a definition of _small_ if it didn't come with awed terror.

The tendrils move against Jon's body. They're icy cold. They hurt even as they numb, and he can understand why death appears in this guise.

"I woke you up," Oliver says. "I could say I saved you, except - I would have never done this. But you were trapped in between. My God had its claws in you, but couldn't actually _get_ you. But it will, in the End. It gets everyone, you know. You can survive old age, and you can survive most wounds. Lots of Avatars do. But they all die. I didn't save you at all. But if you give any credit to walking and talking and praying, you should still be a bit grateful, shouldn't you?"

He's stroking Jon's hair, almost tenderly. His hand is... it's not warm, but it's not cold either, so it feels good. Jon wishes he knew what it feels like, being touched by a human being. He doesn't remember the last time it happened.

Part of Jon wants to be anywhere else, in any other dream. But he can learn here, he can know.

"I... I recognize I'm indebted to you," he answers. Because it's true, and it is, unfortunately, how this Power works. 

"Oh, maybe you do. But your patron certainly doesn't. I'm keeping you here right now, in my own nightmares. I can do this, even if it takes energy I'd rather not be spending. But you know what I usually dream about, don't you?"

"People who will die," Jon answers, through the chattering of his teeth. 

"Yes. This is my knowledge. My burden. And you won't have any of it. The Eye wants to peek, and if I have to, I will shatter and break and burst its spy."

It's told in defiance. He doesn't only want Jon to hear, he wants the Eye to hear. Not that he needs to shout. They are in Jon's dream.

His hands feel still soft, though.

Jon remembers a statement about an End avatar who would kill by getting into people's dreams - he thinks this isn't it, he thinks he can get out of this alive, waking up with a scream. But even if it's - dreaming about dying, about having his eyes burst, he doesn't want...

But he can take it, and he will. He knows he will, if there's no other way out.

"I don't want to do this," Jon says. "I don't want to steal your dreams. If you know how I can stop it, tell me."

Oliver gives a bitter, short laugh. He grasps at Jon's shoulders, hard, and there's no tenderness left at all.

"And I didn't want to kill those people!" he says. "I didn't want to see people's deaths! That's what I told myself, anyway. But it was not true. It was never true. Maybe since the first time I laid motionless on someone else's sofa, because I had no more home, and thought without words that death was more desirable than anything in the world. Maybe sooner. But in this world it's both the only certitude and the only justice and I just needed - to know that I had given It my heart and soul. And you, _you_ , the Archivist, you would pretend you don't _know_ what you serve, what you want, what you adore?"

His voice suddenly gets soft again, but even more threatening. "You can pretend you forgot that you made your choice. I was there, at your bedside, when you did. You want to be here. You want to see and know. But soon you no longer will."

The tendrils that prevented every move tighten against Jon's body, trying to _get in_.

He can't tell if they're strong, but the cold makes them still feel like lashes. He'd thought it was finished. He'd thought his whole body was numbed, but they enter...

They must have slid under his clothes, as they enter his most intimate places, invade, and it hurts fiercely, but not enough so he can't know what's happening to him, so he can't feel the humiliation. 

Jon gasps and moans and writhes in pained surprise. He can't contain a few tears. Oliver's strong hand wipes them off.

"It's quite... pleasant." He tells, in a conversational voice. "Offering this kind of sacrifice. It is necessary and just, but not only that. You certainly can _know_ I haven't had a boyfriend for a long time, Archivist."

Jon's God is looking. It's not doing anything, and Jon knows that It won't, he knows this better than he knows anything in the world. But the Eye registers the whole of his helplessness, It relishes it. And even as Jon screams (for a very short time, before other tendrils creep into his mouth) he knows he's still serving, trying to understand, to catalogue, the Death that claims eternal ownership of him, of everyone. He's still looking at the tendrils, what they look like, he's still trying to peer into Oliver's mind, to _understand_.

"How can you not even close your eyes?" Oliver asks. "Is all this only knowledge to you? How far gone are you?"

Jon doesn't know if it's good or if it's bad that in this situation - of pain and shame - he can still shiver at the idea that a full Avatar is asking him this question. Someone who worships without a second thought, but Jon isn't like that, he isn't!

He's almost sure he isn't.

As if they agree with Oliver's comment, the tendrils invade his eyes, his ears. The pain is - Jon can no longer tell whether it's the pain, or the cold, or the sensory deprivation. It's taking a part of him.

And then - _then_ the Eye gives him an insight, and he knows Oliver's whole statement, the story he's in. He knows Oliver fled to the end of the world in order not to be a monster. 

And it wasn't enough, and now he's blissfully giving Jon to the dreams of death itself.

And what - what will be enough for Jon? What can he do? He tried to to think about the differences between Oliver and himself, about the resemblances, but... but...

Jon finds himself in another dream, free - no, not free. The tendrils are gone, his skin feels too hot, but the Eye is still here, watching him, closer.

And Oliver's voice echoing within his head, further and further away.

"So we found something you didn't want to know, Archivist. Don't be back."


End file.
